


A Different Strength

by ratherastory



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Grief/Mourning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-22
Updated: 2013-08-22
Packaged: 2017-12-24 07:02:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/936823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ratherastory/pseuds/ratherastory
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i> The panic attacks confirm that he's a terrible father, because he's almost relieved when they happen.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Different Strength

**Author's Note:**

> Neurotic Author's Note #1: Uh, so I guess I'm writing Teen Wolf now? IDK what happened.  
> Neurotic Author's Note #2: This is just me noodling around, trying to wrap my head around Papa Stilinski, for whom I have so much love, I can't even tell you. I'm not sure I got him quite right, but I'm working on it.  
> Neurotic Author's Note #3: I feel like I should apologize for the title. Titles are hard. :P

He knows she's gone even before he walks into the hospital. He knows even before he sees his son all by himself, looking tiny on the waiting room chair, face buried in his hands, the top of his skull dark where his hair is trying to grow back in. Even after all these months it's strange to see him with his head shaved, but he insisted he wanted to do it, to be just like his mother.

"It's important, Dad," he'd said, and it's not like he'd ever been able to refuse the boy anything, not when he could see Claudia's eyes staring back at him from his face.

He'd shaved his own head, too, and Claudia laughed and told him he didn't have the right shape of head for it. Even now he hasn't become used to the feel of stubble under his palm.

The waiting room is deserted. As far as he knows, there's no one left in this entire hospital except him and Stiles—his son doesn't want to be called by his first name anymore, and he understands that. Claudia was the one who named him, the one for whom his name had special significance. He's not going to take that away from Stiles, not that one last link to his mother. He'll call him whatever he wants to be called, if it means it's one less way in which he's failed his family.

Stiles curls up in his lap, face buried in his shirt. He doesn't cry. He hasn't cried once, not since this whole ordeal started, and maybe a better father wouldn't be grateful for that. Maybe a better father would worry that Stiles hasn't shed a tear, that he's still not crying even though he just watched his own mother die at an age when he should still think his parents are immortal and indestructible. But he's never been all that good at any of this; all he knows his how to fake it convincingly and rely on Claudia to fix his mistakes.

So he holds Stiles tightly enough to hurt, and for a little while they both pretend that they don't have to go back in that room, that they don't have to face an entire lifetime without her.

~*~

Melissa hugs him the next time she sees him.

Stiles has fallen asleep, stretched across three chairs in the waiting room, and he's filling out papers, the ballpoint pen scratching against the wooden clipboard he was given. Melissa appears practically out of nowhere, maybe alerted by someone who knows their families are close, and when he gets up she pulls him into her arms.

"I'm so sorry," she says, and he can hear the tears in her voice, unashamed but held back for his sake. "If you need it, Stiles can come sleep over with Scott for a couple of days, while you sort things out."

There are arrangements to be made. He's seen other people have to work these things out, when he's gone to knock on their doors to tell them their lives will never be the same again. There's a funeral home in town, and soon he's going to find himself in the ludicrous position of having to pick out what sort of wood he'd like Claudia to be buried in, and decide what sort of lining her coffin should have. There's the insurance company to call, mountains of paperwork to fill out, because death is complicated and messy and expensive. The bereaved don't get to mourn in peace, because they're too busy proving their bereavement to companies that still want to get paid for services that are no longer required.

He should send Stiles to the McCalls'. God knows he's not in any shape to look after him, and Scott is Stiles' best friend. It would probably do him some good not to be stuck in the same empty house as his father while there are all these things to get done. He can't bring himself to do it, though. He pulls away from Melissa and tries to force a smile, which doesn't succeed. She's warm and soft against him, and it's too tempting to stay there, to take comfort in something that's so close to what he had before and yet just different enough that it hurts like he never thought anything could hurt him again.

"No. No, thanks, I got this. It's probably selfish, but I want to keep him close."

She nods, as if it's perfectly understandable that he'd be putting his own needs ahead of his child's.

"Of course. You've practically been living here, though, so I'm guessing you've got no food left in the house."

He wants to protest, but it's not exactly a secret that he and Stiles have been living on takeout and food grabbed from the hospital cafeteria for weeks now. Ever since Claudia was admitted and they knew she wasn't coming home.

"I'll bring something over later that you can just reheat. Something with vegetables," she adds, smiling softly, and this time he feels the corners of his mouth lift, just a little.

"Can't have Stiles getting scurvy," he agrees, and she nods, eyes full of understanding. "Thank you."

~*~

"Stiles is doing almost too well," the therapist tells him. She's younger than he is by a few years, and likes to wear powder blue cardigans and brown skirts to her ankles. "Not that it's a bad thing that he's coping, of course, but… ."

There's an array of drawings in the file folder the therapist is holding. Stiles is never going to be an artist, at least not a talented one, but he's never lacked in imagination. His drawings are filled with monsters, vampires and werewolves and things he's seen in movies that his mother never wanted him to watch. Godzilla is chewing on the corner of a building in one of them, fire belching from his mouth, and he smiles and finds himself fighting the impulse to ask to keep this one so he can Al bring it home to hang on the refrigerator. Claudia would have laughed at it.

"But it's normal, right? I mean… boys his age love this stuff."

"When I asked him to draw how he was feeling, he drew this," she says, pointing to an illustration of what looks like the wall-climbing scene from the beginning of _Dracula_. The book, not the movie. "And when I asked him to draw his family, he came up with this," she points to the picture of Godzilla. "He's saying everything he thinks I want to hear."

"He might have gotten distracted. He does that—a lot," he adds a little wryly, but she shakes her head.

"Art therapy isn't an exact science, but between this and what he's been saying… Stiles doesn't feel safe discussing his feelings with me. Do you talk about his mother at all?"

There's a sudden lump in his throat, threatening to cut off his air. He swallows and, when he realizes that his voice has deserted him, he shakes his head.

"Has Stiles cried at all?" she asks, and all he can do is shake his head. She manages not to look disapproving or worried, but he suspects neither reaction would be amiss, under the circumstances. Her tone shifts subtly. "I know you're trying to be strong for him, Sheriff, and that's a good thing. We all want to protect our kids. But you need to show him that he's allowed to be sad, that he can grieve and still be the kind of man you want him to be."

She's not telling him that he's a terrible father, but she doesn't have to. He shakes his head again.

"I don't—"  
 _I don't know_ , is what he wants to stay, but he stops himself. The words are impotent, an admission of defeat he's not quite ready to make yet. He takes a deep breath.

"I'll talk to him."

~*~

The panic attacks confirm that he's a terrible father, because he's almost relieved when they happen. Stiles tends to hide away like a wounded animal, wedging himself in the furthest, darkest corners of the house, but a lifetime of tracking down petty criminals means Stiles is no match for his father. Especially not when he's breathing so loudly that it feels like every gasp echoes through the house, drowning out all other sounds.

The panic attacks are something that can be fixed, something concrete with which he can deal in the here and now, rather than the enormity of facing life without Claudia. Of watching their son grow up without her. Stiles is hyperventilating in a way that he almost envies, each breath shallower than the last, skinny arms wrapped around knobby knees in his faded Spiderman pajamas, head down. It's not the terrible, high-pitched wheeze that he's accustomed to hearing from Scott when his asthma is flaring up, the sound that tells him that it's time to cut short the sleepover and call Melissa while he's driving the kids to the ER. This is the sound of pure, unadulterated panic, because Stiles' mother is _gone_ and she's never coming back.

He's dealt with panicky victims before. Stiles might be his kid, his baby, and that might make it personal, but he knows how to handle this, even as everything else is falling apart around him. Tonight Stiles looks up when he comes in, eyes wide and terrified in his face that looks so much like his mother's. It's unusual—usually he keeps his face hidden as though that will protect him from all the pain in the world. Tonight, though, he raises his arms when his father crouches by him. It's child's play, then, to pull Stiles into his lap and wrap his arms around him.

"I got you," he whispers in his son's ear. "I got you, kiddo. Close your eyes and listen to my breathing, okay? Listen close, now, we're going to take a breath together. That's it, that's it, easy now…"

It takes several tries, but finally Stiles is able to pull in a gulping breath, then another, and he sags back against his father, ear pressed to his chest, as if he might be able to match their heartbeats the same way he matched their breathing. They stay that way for a long time, until his own legs have gone numb and Stiles' eyes have closed, the small ribcage rising and falling under his hand. He stares into the darkness until his eyes start to burn and prickle; he's sure Stiles has fallen asleep, but a moment later he feels him stir in his arms. Stiles raises his hand and gently brushes tiny fingers over his father's cheeks, and he's surprised at the sudden sensation of wetness there.

"It's okay, Daddy. Don't cry."

He pulls Stiles closer and swallows the lump in his throat before trying to talk.

"It's okay to cry if you're sad, buddy. I know you miss your mom too…"

He feels Stiles start to cry silently a moment later, tears soaking through the thin fabric of his t-shirt. He's ready for it, though, has been waiting for this. He cradles the back of his son's head to hold him steady, kisses his forehead, and cries with him.


End file.
